Washington, DC /Christian News/ — U.S. District Judge Vaughn R. Walker, in his August 4 ruling overturning California’s Proposition 8, attacked religious doctrines disapproving of same-sex relations and distinguishing them from the marriage of man and woman. “Religious beliefs that gay and lesbian relationships are sinful or inferior to heterosexual relationships harm gays and lesbians,” Walker stated as a “finding of fact.”

Walker classified such beliefs among the “stereotypes and misinformation,” the “fear or unarticulated dislike of same-sex couples,” that allegedly motivate those who uphold the marriage of man and woman. As examples of such prejudicial beliefs, the judge cited official teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, the Southern Baptist Convention, the Orthodox Church in America, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, and the Free Methodist Church.

Walker’s decision cast suspicion on the campaign for Proposition 8 because religious groups were prominent among its endorsers. He looked askance at the fact that “84 percent of people who attend church voted in favor of Proposition 8.” The decision concluded that there is no rational basis for “the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples.”

Alan Wisdom, the Institute on Religion and Democracy’s Vice President for Research and Programs, commented:

What business does a federal judge have declaring as a ‘finding of fact’ that religious beliefs are harmful or beneficial to any group? Who is he to look into the hearts of religious believers and see only ‘stereotypes and misinformation,’ ‘fear or unarticulated dislike’? Since when was a law held in suspicion because religious bodies endorsed it and churchgoers voted for it?

Roman Catholics, Southern Baptists, and others who affirm the marriage of man and woman regard it as a blessing, not a harm, for all of society. They counsel people against all non-marital sexual relations, heterosexual or homosexual, because marriage provides the best environment for both adults and children to flourish. And there is abundant social science evidence to confirm this moral conviction. Judge Walker, sadly, discounts all this evidence and prefers to attack the motives of Proposition 8 supporters.

The judge insists that ‘Proposition 8 does not affect the First Amendment rights of those opposed to marriage for same-sex couples.’ But his ruling confirms the warnings about what happens to traditional religious believers when the state decrees that there is no difference between marriage and same-sex relationships. He singles out by name America’s largest religious bodies and labels them as oppressors of gay people and prejudiced enemies of state policy. Can it be long before the full weight of government pressure will be brought to bear upon these allegedly ‘misinformed’ religious people who distinguish between marriage and other sexual relationships? We have already seen the dangers with same-sex marriage in Massachusetts and the District of Columbia, where the Catholic Church has been driven out of the adoption business.